Official
newsletter of the Battle of Midway Roundtable
“To
promote awareness and understanding of the great battle,
and
to honor the men who fought and won it.”
17
AUGUST 2007..........ISSUE NO. 2007-30..........OUR 10th YEAR
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AROUND THE TABLE ===============
Members’
topics in this issue:
1. Communication Failures at the BOM
2. Why Course 265 True?
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1. COMMUNICATIONS FAILURES AT THE BOM (see issues #26, 27, 28, 29)
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29 July 2007
Barrett Tillman
Arizona
btillman63@hotmail.com
Re Gray's
mission: I didn't know him well but he
responded a couple of times when I queried him, mainly about naval fighter
operations.
Early in my
acquaintance with Dick Best, the controversial subject of Gray's performance at
the BOM arose. His blue eyes got all squinty and he said, "I was a
fighter pilot before I switched to bombers. A fighter pilot's job is to
die getting the bombers to their target, if need be."
That's almost
verbatim.
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2. WHY COURSE 265 TRUE? (see issue #28, 29)
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7 Aug 2007
CAPT
Roy P. Gee, Sr., USN-Ret
Southern
California
(BOM
vet, SBD pilot, VB-8, USS Hornet)
rgee@san.rr.com
Let’s examine some of the reasoning behind Mitscher's order to Ring to
fly a course of 265 true. John
Lundstrom, in Black Shoe Carrier Admiral, p. 236, says that “Nimitz
firmly believed the enemy would most likely operate his carriers in two
separate, mutually supporting groups as it was thought they had done
before...Nimitz clearly believed such an initial separation of enemy
carriers greatly enhanced his chances for a devastating counterattack,
particularly if it came as a complete surprise. The key was to take
advantage of surprise to eliminate one carrier group at the outset.
“The group attacking Midway was likeliest to be spotted first. There was the added benefit of possibly
catching its planes on deck being rearmed for further strikes on the island.
The primary weapon for this attack was to be Spruance's TF-16 (Enterprise
and Hornet), kept ‘cocked and primed’ as a single unit, while other
forces handled searches. Once
one Japanese carrier group appeared within range, Fletcher, wielding
tactical command, would release Spruance to hurl his full striking power of 120
planes, capable of destroying at least two carriers at once. Browning's staff was to ensure this
supremely vital attack went off without a hitch.
“In the meantime, Fletcher would decide whether TF-17 (Yorktown)
engaged the second enemy group—the most desirable course of action—or followed
up Spruance's attack. Fletcher retained
the flexibility to launch searches and fill in with attacks against one group
or another as necessary. Should events
go the way Nimitz, Fletcher, and Spruance hoped, the second phase would see
three U.S. carriers finish off two remaining flattops. In truth, Nagumo never divided his four
carriers. That misunderstanding on the part of Nimitz and others would cause
grave repercussions in the subsequence battle.”
And this is why Mitscher's order to Ring to fly a course of 265 true
turned out to be a “flight to nowhere.”
If Ring had really
flown a southwest course, there's every reason to believe he would have found Kido
Butai just like Waldron did.
Please consider that in 1942 we did not really know how Kido Butai
conducted their carrier operations. We knew they operated six carriers at Pearl
Harbor, and whether it was a six-carrier task force or separate
two-carrier task forces, we couldn't have cared less at the time. And, I haven't come across any info that we
knew how the IJN conducted air ops in the Indian Ocean. We certainly learned how they operated
in the BOM and their capability astonished our admirals.
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Ed. note: I asked Mac Showers and Jon Parshall if they
had any ideas as to the basis for CINCPAC believing Kido Butai would operate its carriers at Midway in
widely separated divisions, since they apparently did nothing like that in the
Pearl Harbor and Indian Ocean (Ceylon) raids.
Here are their responses.
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8 Aug 2007
RADM D. M. “Mac”
Showers, USN-Ret
Virginia
(BOM vet, intel
analyst, CIU [HYPO] Pearl Harbor)
macrain@att.net
I
have no intelligence recollections on the two vs. four IJN carrier issue, and I
don't recall ever hearing the subject discussed (except on the Roundtable).
If Nimitz took a position on this (as in Op-Plan 29-42), it must have come from
some non-intelligence source on his staff at the time the plan was drawn
up. I think this is very probable.
Why or from whom it came, however, I haven't a guess.
I've
always thought that Howard Ady's first report of having seen only two carriers
(due to cloud cover, etc.) became the genesis of any carrier separation
discussion. If that be the case, however, the subject is moot
because we now know that all four carriers were really together, as were the
six at Pearl Harbor.
Hope
these comments may be helpful in your deliberations
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7 Aug 2007
Jonathan B. Parshall
Minnesota
(co-author, Shattered
Sword)
jonp@combinedfleet.com
John Lundstrom is the real expert on this
matter, but in a nutshell that was the initial expectation of Nimitz, et
al—that Nagumo would be operating in a dispersed fashion. My belief is that this was basically just
mirror-imaging on the part of the Americans:
"We operate our carriers in dispersed groups, so the Japanese must,
too." And while it's true that Pearl Harbor and Ceylon relied upon
the efforts of 5 to 6 carriers, we had no way of knowing that those flight
decks were tactically unified. No Americans
saw Kido Butai on December 7th.
It’s true that the British bombers that
attacked Kido Butai during the Ceylon raid may have seen that
this is how the Japanese were operating, but I don’t know if they understood
the ramifications of what they were seeing or communicated any of that to the
Americans. Bottom line: the
Americans expected that the Japanese would be operating a large number of
carriers, but had no real clue as to how the Japanese preferred to use
those. That's not surprising—even today
Japanese carrier operations aren't all that well understood on this side of the
pond.
John
may well have more to impart on this topic—he knows more than I do.
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8 Aug 2007
John B. Lundstrom
Wisconsin
(author, The First
Team, Black Shoe Carrier Admiral)
jbl1942@aol.com
You ask the key
question, why that course? [265 true
for the Hornet air group.] That
will never be definitively answered. I
truly wonder how much contact Spruance had with Mitscher before they sailed
from Pearl, or did Browning [Spruance’s chief of staff] handle it all? What did Mitscher think of Browning? I can't imagine they got along. What did Mitscher think of coming under
“blackshoes” after Halsey was relieved, especially in what could be the first
decisive carrier battle? I wish someone
had saved any directives Spruance gave Mitscher prior to the battle. If Fletcher had not come back to Pearl [from
the Coral Sea] earlier than Nimitz thought he would (although Fletcher arrived
when he said he would), then Spruance would have sailed before the Yorktown
came in, leaving no chance for conferring.
It is amazing how little time there was to confer for such an important
battle.
My guess is that Mitscher went by his gut instinct of where the second group
[of IJN carriers] was likely to be, and put Ring north of it so he would know
to turn left (south) for his return leg and search if he didn't spot the enemy
outright. Of course such a "shot
in the dark" strike plan drove Waldron nuts and should have given Mitchell
[VF-8 CO] pause, as their planes lacked the gas to fly such a long mission.
Jon is right to say
that the USN did not have a clear indication of exactly how the Japanese
operated their carriers prior to Midway.
Right after Pearl Harbor it was thought that one group of Japanese CVs
might have been as much as 500 miles away from the other. Soon, though, it was decided they had been
"together," but what does that mean?
Nothing the IJN did at Pearl, according to the USN, would have precluded
the carriers being deployed in groups 50 or so miles apart. At Coral Sea not only was the
"Ryukaku" [Shoho]operating well away from the main CV body,
but Shokaku and Zuikaku were also thought to be some distance
apart.
It is also very
significant that the Midway PBYs were ordered to continue searching their
sectors until all four enemy CVs were reported as located. The whole fundamental sequence of the battle
from the USN side cannot be understood until it is realized that the U.S.
thought the 4 IJN CVs would be operating in separate groups. Unfortunately so few of the planning
documents have survived. So much of it
was, too, I think, being a reflection of the current USN CV wisdom.
Regarding Mitscher's
decision to send the Hornet air group [HAG] west, it's so difficult to
ascribe specific reasons why he did it (other than that "gut" of
his). First of all, I doubt Mitscher
knew all that much about Coral Sea other than a very sketchy outline listing
casualties and a few combat lessons. I
don't think he knew about the 7 May mistake that sent the TF-17 strike to the
wrong target [Shoho]. Fletcher's
detailed battle report with most of the subordinate reports was only submitted
about 28 May, so Mitscher may not have known all that much.
It also occurs to me [to doubt] how much Mitscher knew of the informal plan to
have TF-16 automatically hit the first group of IJN CVs to be sighted in
range. Browning may not have bothered to tell him. Mitscher may not have had all the facts or
had been carefully briefed. There was,
after all, no time for that.
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===============
NOW HEAR THIS! ===============
News
& info in this issue:
- Course 265 True: Closing the Book
- BOM Pilots on the Internet
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COURSE
265 TRUE: CLOSING THE BOOK
Whether
the Hornet air group (HAG) flew a mysterious westbound course on the
first day of the carrier battle, or southwest as indicated in RADM Mitscher’s
after-action report has been a burning question on the Roundtable and beyond
for a very long time. There are
compelling reasons for believing both accounts, but course 265 degrees true is
supported by the preponderance of veteran testimony, so the following
discussion will assume that that’s what actually happened.
Since
initial examination on a chart seems to indicate that the HAG’s westerly course
makes no sense at all, the first question that arises is, was it a
mistake? (See p. 218 in A Glorious
Page In Our History, p. 190 in Shattered Sword, or p. 135 in No Right
to Win.) Did CDR Ring, known by his
pilots to be an unskilled aviator, simply botch his heading? Did he really intend to head southwest like
the EAG (Enterprise air group) and simply make a wrong turn? We have one example of compelling testimony
that says otherwise. Bowen Weisheit
quotes RADM Walter Rodee, VS-8 skipper at the BOM, as telling him that “the
course they gave us...was about 265...it was almost due west.” And that came after a deliberate attempt by
Weisheit to bait the admiral into saying the course was 240 (see The Last
Flight of Ensign C. Markland Kelly, Junior, USNR, p. 88.) So 265 was no mistake. It was the heading Ring intended to fly, and
he apparently did so.
The
next question, then, is why?
With Kido Butai being 75 to 100 miles beyond the point where the
HAG would intersect their track on course 265, what possible rationale could
there be for such an apparently bizarre course? In 1984 John Lundstrom gave what may have been the first inkling
of an answer in The First Team (first edition, p. 333): “Spruance’s orders called for search-attack
procedure by the strike planes, indicating he was not certain all of the
Japanese carriers were located where the PBY had found two of
them.” John expanded that notion in
2006 in Black Shoe Carrier Admiral, p. 248: “It appears that Mitscher, worried by Ady’s PBY report of only
two enemy carriers, took it upon himself to search for and strike the supposed
second group of enemy carriers thought to be behind the lead group.” If a remotely plausible reason for flying
west from the Hornet is to be found, that very likely is it. Under the circumstances, anything else seems
beyond comprehension.
And
of course, that gives rise to the next question: why did anyone think that Kido Butai would operate its
carriers in dispersed groups? From the
standpoint of Fletcher and Spruance, the question is moot since that’s what’s
stated in CINCPAC’s op-plan for the BOM (see last week’s issue). But how did that idea develop among Admiral
Nimitz’ staff, since there was no intelligence and little if any evidence that
the Japanese actually operated their carriers that way? Lundstrom and Parshall have offered above
what may be the best answer. In
essence, carrier warfare was so new in early 1942 (especially for the U.S.)
that when intelligence was lacking as to the enemy’s intentions, American
planners probably just filled in the blanks with guesswork based on their own
operating doctrine. Thus, the strategy
Fletcher would use to seek and attack the enemy was based on little more than a
guess that Kido Butai would send widely separated carrier divisions to
Midway. He complied by ordering
Spruance to hit the first enemy carriers found with the full force of TF-16,
while he would reserve TF-17 (Yorktown) to search for and hit the
“following” carriers, or to support TF-16 if no following carriers are found.
Unfortunately,
while that strategy was well known to Spruance and Browning, the word
apparently never got to Mitscher on the Hornet. That seems incredible with the advantage of hindsight, but
U.S. doctrine back then provided for very little cooperation between carriers,
even those in the same task group.
Browning’s troublesome personality probably exacerbated the problem.
Therefore,
it would seem that Mitscher took it upon himself to go after the “following”
carriers, assuming that the EAG would take care of the two found by Ady. (What he thought the Yorktown planes
were supposed to be doing is anyone’s guess.)
Thus
it seems we can finally close the book on the issue of course 265 degrees true
for the HAG. If any new or contrary
revelations or even some interesting alternate theories ever come up, we can
certainly revisit the subject, and that will probably happen. For now, though, it’s likely that the best
answers have been found as to the “where and why” of the
HAG on the morning of 4 June 1942.
As
an interesting postscript, it’s a little chilling to speculate what might have
happened if the entire HAG had followed VT-8 to Nagumo’s carriers, as suggested
above by Roy Gee. All things being
equal, they would have arrived there long before any Enterprise or Yorktown
planes showed up, suggesting that the Japanese CAP would have been well
disposed for meeting the threat. What
would have ensued in that case is pure speculation, but at the very least the
Japanese would have been alerted to dive bombers well before McClusky and
Leslie got to them. Would the BOM then
have turned out worse for the American side?
As has been stated on the Roundtable for years, almost any scenario you
can imagine other than what actually happened would have done exactly that.
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BOM PILOTS ON THE
INTERNET
John Greaves sent in several URLs focusing on various
TF-16 and TF-17 pilots from the BOM.
These will probably be new to many Roundtable members.
John C. Waldron (Torpedo 8):
http://www.state.sd.us/military/vetaffairs/sdwwiimemorial/subpages/profiles/display.asp?P=1984
Grant Teats (Torpedo 8):
http://alumni.oregonstate.edu/stater/issues/Stater0012/IMAGES/teats.jpg
Lance E. Massey (Torpedo 3):
http://www.ussmassey.org/html/shipmasseybio.html
Wesley Osmus (Torpedo 3):
http://www.uiaa.org/urbana/veterans/display_veteran.asp?veteranID=367
John C. Butler (Bombing 3):
http://www.jcbutlerazdesa.com/History.htm
Harold J. Ellison (Torpedo 8):
http://www.usshjellisondd864.org/haroldjellison.html
F. T. Weber (Bombing 6)
http://www.thezephyr.com/ftweber.jpg
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Get
the Roundtable’s Book:
NO
RIGHT TO WIN: A CONTINUING DIALOGUE WITH VETERANS OF THE BATTLE OF MIDWAY
Click
for full information: http://www.russbook.com/
(If
you cannot access the above web site, send a message to the editor for full
details on No Right to Win.)
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http://www.midway42.org/glossary.htm
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